SPY, the hilarious satirical/investigative 90’s magazine, had a regular feature entitled “Logrolling in our Time,” which combed through the major literary journals and book reviews and showed the regularity with which authors traded glowing reviews of each other’s books. As you may have guessed, logrolling is also a political term.
Both Senator Lou Correa, facing a possibly strong challenger in Anaheim Republican Lucille Kring, and Assemblyman Jose Solorio, facing not such a strong challenge from God-knows-whom, have opted to endorse labor-friendly Republican John Leos for Anaheim City Council over the two DPOC-endorsed progressive Democrats in the race, Bill Dalati and John Santoianni. Coming on top of some very destructive reactionary votes from both legislators, this development is offensive to many of us Democrats, cementing as it were Lou’s and Jose’s positions at the very right wing of the party.
Immediately on receiving the two endorsements, Mr. Leos put out a pair of press releases obviously aimed at his Republican constituency, briefly boasting of the endorsements before quickly moving on to laud both Democrats for their tough-on-crime stances, fiscal responsibility, and hostility to graffiti and bloated pensions.
And then right on cue, just as a baby bird is fed regurgitated worm from its mother’s mouth, the “Liberal OC” dutifully and without a murmur passed on these press releases to its puzzled readers. It always takes a certain amount of forensic skill to determine if an LOC post is a piece of original writing or a press release, and if it is a press release, where exactly it came from, but tests in our laboratories have determined a Leos paternity. Judging by the comments sections there, the few LOC readers left are in a state of bewilderment over why that blog is posting Republican press releases targeted to Republican readers reassuring them how conservative their Democratic legislators really are.
No doubt this is a great idea politically for all three men, and maybe even for the cause of Labor. Leos gets Democratic votes, while Lou and Jose will siphon crucial Anaheim Republican votes from their challengers (to add to their Democrats who have no other choice.) But it’s a pretty rough deal for the actual Democrats in the Council race.
- John Leos posing with a cop.
I spoke with Mr. Leos, a vast hulking bear of a guy, for a few minutes at the OC Labor Federation event Saturday, where he was the only Republican (that I noticed) who had a booth. I asked him in what ways exactly he differs with the Democratic Party, trying to get a sense of just how right-wing he might be. The first two issues he came up with were his strong support of the death penalty, and fierce opposition to gun control. As a firearms enthusiast he really resents the new law (from Nava I think?) making him jump through some more hoops, including giving fingerprints, each time he wants to buy ammo; like he says, the crooks don’t have to bother with such niceties. Of course I told him there are plenty of Dem politicians who agree with him on those issues for what it’s worth. He is a “second amendment absolutist.” “Do you believe in ANY gun control at all?” He took some time thinking about that, but then was saved by a friend walking up and starting a new conversation.
Maybe Leos would be a fine councilman; it’s not like the new office would put him in more of a position to shoot more people. But Dalati and Santoianni would also be fine councilmen (with good ideas we’ll look at on this blog.) And these endorsements will make it a lot more difficult for them to prevail. And Orange County Democrats should be upset; the level of City Council and School Boards and such is where our party begins to grow, so we can continue to attempt to fight Republican anti-government madness on the county, state and federal level in the difficult decades to come.
A new paradigm developing in the OC: Three major parties?
At the Labor celebration, watching Leos fraternize with Solorio, watching Harry Sidhu joshing with Chris Prevatt, and seeing the triumphal entrance of rightwing Christian but labor-friendly Republican Huntington Beach Mayor Cathy Green, I realized we are really starting to look at THREE major parties in the OC (excuse my primitive Paintbrush skills)
The Big-Tent Democratic Party has grown on both the left and the right, and we bicker over priorities and we vote but we stay together. Meanwhile Scott Baugh’s anti-union jihad has been isolating those (surprising number of) Republicans who have always been close to labor, until they’re increasingly having to ally with us.
Labor gets a good deal out of this, having the middle rectangle at “hello,” and almost always having us Progressives on their side as well. The difference is that us Progressives have other issues BESIDES labor that occasionally take priority over it. For example,
- Occasionally for us Progressives environmental and open space concerns will trump Labor’s desire for new construction jobs; as a couple of years ago in the intra-Dem brouhaha over Trestles.
- We will frequently disagree with police and prison guard unions over civil liberties, drug decriminalization, draconian laws, the endless building and filling of prisons, the growing surveillance state, and so on.
- Believe it or not, we Progressives are more fiscally responsible than the Labor Dems (at least since Howard Dean made fiscal responsibility a progressive hallmark) and we can say no to unaffordable unfunded demands from anyone including Labor.
But progressives, unlike the zealots on the right, are fully and enthusiastically supportive of the right of Labor to organize and fight for the interests of its members.
I’m just hashing this out here, does it make any sense? I think it at least describes the way things are right now more accurately than thinking of just TWO major parties. Any feedback is welcome.
Santoianni
Dalati
Meanwhile on the Anaheim City Council race, we’ll be interviewing and supporting Bill Dalati and John Santoianni here – at least me and our Anaheim reporter Gabriel San Roman will – because we like people who really are what they pretend to be.
I like what you have outlined. Solorio and Correa have been huge failures in the past recent weeks in terms of legislation. (Documented and discussed on this blog, not so much on that other blog) Their endorsements in Anaheim follow in the same vein.
As for your new political layout…Solorio/Correa are cropping non-progressive underlings. Pro-labor Republicans are an oxymoron. (Even reactionary pro-labor Dems!) But that’s what happens when Labor has been so co-opted and whittled down (to where tagging along to Harrah’s OBP project is seen as some progressive development as opposed to being fed some crumbs by a mass developer so he can get what he wants)
Leos saying gun control and death penalty are the issues of his Republicanism is interesting. In Demopublican world, Prez Obama has actually been lax on gun control (nothing says summer vacation like going to Yosemite packing heat!) and who has been ratcheting it up against the Death Penalty in the Democratic Party lately? I think its inhumane, economically wasteful, and just plain stupid…So those are the issues, eh? Whatever…
Vern,
Chris Prevatt clearly explained why the “Liberal” OC is shilling for a Republican when he responded by saying, “Let’s see Vern, TheLiberalOC is a pro-labor, pro-worker site.”
How silly of you for opining that you are surprised that they are promoting Republican’s over there. I guess you were just confused because the name says “Liberal”OC and they say they are “challenging the right-wing noise machine”.
Oh! I guess I see what you mean. Looks like Prevatt and his blog may be guilty of false advertising.
John Leos is OCEA’s guy.
He doesn’t really talk about this much.
Instead, he does when he talks about saving the taxpayers money by instituting millions in savings with negoitiating the new retirement benefit plan(that I’m not sure if any new county employee or tenured employee has moved into) I think the savings was projected but he’s throwing it out like it already happened.
I think OCEA thinks this type of candidate, Hispanic, Republican in a city where Hispanics have been the top vote getters, will be key to this guys election.
But, unfortunately I think the Anaheim voters will see the through this and decide to pass on Leos.
I’m very surprised that Lou doesn’t actively endorse Bill D. because he needs help reaching out to alll of the communities and Bill would help.
All those lists of endorsements from politicians for each other are not paid a lick of attention by voters. All voters look for is the candidate’s picture and anything that talks about who the candidate is and what they will do because we don’t remember from election to election and we don’t focus on political news ever. So save your energy now and concentrate on that eleventh hour hit piece he wont be able to answer with all kinds of rumors and innuendo.
I disagree with your analysis. There are only two major parties in Orange County. Right wing Republican nuts and Labor. When has the Democratic party been of any significance?